83C

I very nearly did something really stupid/fucking amazing (delete as appropriate) today, a VXR8 came up for sale at a very reasonable price needing a bit of paint but otherwise good with 12 months MoT. Almost sent the seller a deposit but couldn’t make the timings work out around work for collection as they were the other side of the country. Common sense says I should be glad I have the money to put to other boring shit like home improvements and next year’s possible house move, but I came close last year to buying an ‘R8 before the Bentley hove into view and today I had the chance to have both. Going to be kicking myself for a while I think. In other news I’m considering what is best for the Range Rover. I think next year it’s going to get a few quid spent on the body, new tailgate, at least a partial respray, wheel refurb, rear suspension overhaul, underside protection etc. I could just sell it and buy a newer L322 or just about stretch to an early L405 but I don’t really see the point in going to a later L322 as I know mine well, it does everything I want and despite being the 3.0 M57 diesel goes plenty well enough for what I need in a big 4x4 - it towed a big tri-axle trailer with Mrs. 83C’s Mini Countryman aboard a few months ago and didn’t even notice it was there. I’m not overly struck on the L405’s looks, it doesn’t appeal visually like the 322 does, so I might as well stick with what I know, spend a few quid and make it properly good for another 5 years.

Very nice, there are considerably worse ways to travel.

The Range Rover is back on the road but throwing lots of Suspension Fault issues. I suspect this is partly because the car has been sitting for over a month, and partly because the load level sensors are fairly knackered. New ones will be fitted and calibrated. The A8 continues to give stress-free motoring, I had organised a deal to sell it at the end of the month to a friend who drove it and liked it, but a week later I spotted another A8 for sale on eBay and sent him the link - one successful bid later and this was the result: His is a slightly different spec to mine (SE rather than Sport Quattro) which means it loses the steering wheel paddles, steering feels a bit lighter and the ride is a bit softer, as well as having the 5-spoke 19’s. Same engine though, and it goes well and is cosmetically a bit better. I’m in two minds over the A8, I really like it but now that the Range Rover is back I don’t really need it any more - the plan always had been for it to be a summer car whilst the L322 was off the road for suspension work and then pass it on. I suppose if anyone waves £2500 at me I’d let it go, but I really don’t mind if it stays until next year.

Nah, the Countryman is a decent machine. Mrs. 83C has one, it does everything she wants from round town to 600+ mile round trips to Cornwall. Well put together, some clever touches that make sense in a family car, handles very well and good on fuel. The whole ‘Not Mini’ thing has been done to death, even the small Bini is much bigger than the Issigonis original but then so is everything else. Thank Euro-NCAP testing, people growing, requirements changing etc for that. If a 1959 Mini was designed to meet today’s standards, it would be about the size of a Bini. BMW Group have put some questionable machines out, especially recently (BMW XM Label Red, I’m looking at you), but compared to the full size 4x4s that really are losing the plot and forgetting why they existed in the first place the Mini range is fairly sensible with the exception of the original Paceman - it was a solution looking for a question to answer.

That the place in Lanner?

Wonder if it started life as a RHD car or whether it’s been converted? My ‘84 Mex was a left hooker. Possibly interested when it comes up, weirdly I’d want it more if it were wrong hand drive.

I always used to explain to new drivers that the first crumple zone was their knees. Buses are not built with protection of the driver in mind and even lower speed incidents are enough to shove the dash, steering wheel and front end backwards. It’s all box section and thin plate, easy to just cut off and replace as required. RIP to the driver involved here.

Yes, that’s a trimmed bit of bicycle inner tube repair patch. If it holds I’ll be amazed but it’s not there for that reason. It’s there to hold the two sides of the split together whilst the glue sets, it’ll probably fly off within the first few miles. That won’t be until next month though.

To be honest I think that’ll be the plan. It doesn’t actually look too much of a pain in the arse to get enough movement in the hub (all the fixings have been apart recently of course) to swing it out of the way and get the driveshaft out, but I’m looking at the driveshaft nut itself and thinking it’s going to be a pain in the arse, not to mention disassembling the CV joint to get the boot off. Off to Halfords I suppose to see what is available. Got to collect the oil for it anyway.

All the front suspension done, back together and awaiting a trip to have the tracking done. Let’s just have a quick check over everything else, steering goes lock-to-lock fine, hang on, what’s that smear of grease? Wipe away to reveal: Oh for fu…

To be completely fair the car is 17 years and 213,000 miles old, and doesn’t leak oil for ‘protection’ like a Series does. Most fixings and fasteners do come apart fairly well, I reckon the nut that got the chop would have come off had I been able to get the ugga-dugga gun on it. The track rods being locked together is probably someone not using a bit of anti-seize compound the last time the outer rods were replaced. I reckon the inners are the originals, certainly the gaiters had BMW logos and part numbers on so they’ve done pretty bloody well - hopefully the Lemforder replacements last a while. The old ones were actually perfectly serviceable but these days I tend to buy the lot and replace in one hit rather than either find out half way through that the extras are actually needed, or have to do it all again six months later. Repeating everything for a £10 part that could have been done the first time around gets very tedious, very quickly. I don’t think the L322 is any worse than anything else of the period, I’ve wrangled E38, E61 and F10 suspension bits with similar problems/results as well as my sister’s 1988 110 which throws far more trouble my way than the L322 ever does. I will say though that like any big complex car that is aged and high on miles the L322 needs a constant drip-feed of money, time and parts to keep it going, the biggest issue with them is when people stop the maintenance and then it either needs all the suspension doing/gearbox shits itself/engine goes pop/electrics fuck up/whatever, and suddenly it’s on eBay/bookface/bumfree at scrap price as yet another ‘unreliable’ Land Rover product. The A8 is the same - it’s fine provided there is an acceptance that age and mileage will not have been kind, and some sort of bill is upcoming at any given moment, but the chances of it being ruinous can be reduced with some decent preventative maintenance and getting on top of issues before they eat your wallet.

Part of the logic of buying the A8 was the need to rectify some faults on the L322. For a while now it’s been knocking at the front and getting worse and worserer, so a new set of inner and outer track rods were bought as well as new gaiters. Old one came off easily, though it was at this point that I realised all the play was in the outer ball joint, not the inner end like I’d previously thought - grabbing the TRE and wadging a pry bar in hadn’t revealed any movement on the ground but there had been a rattle the last time I had the wheels off for the front trailing arm replacement in March. But as there were all new parts ready to fit I thought it daft not to do so. All new, except one bit. Where the thread for the inner track rod screws into the outer rod there is a collar that the securing nut winds onto, so that the split end of the outer road casting firmly clamps onto the threads of the inner. This collar wasn’t included in either of the new bits, so I’d need to reuse the old ones. Bit of a pain as I’d banked on having the old ones undisturbed to match the lengths prior to taking the car for proper tracking adjustment but oh well. Securing nut wound out, collar moved. Could I get the inner and outer rods to unwind? Could I fuck. Well and truly seized together so it was angle grinder time. After pre-assembling the new track rod it was offered up and fitted. It was about this point where my carefully planned afternoon all turned to shit. The boot on the leading lower arm looked a bit odd. This arm had been fine at MoT in April and had no discernible play even with the BFO crowbar wedged in, but the boot was clearly fucked and would only cause problems next April if not sooner. Fortunately I’d already bought a set of lower arms as I had planned to fit them in March but ended up not needing to at the time. Just the small matter of removing the old one. Visible threads cleaned, but I couldn’t use a socket - the driveshaft sits right over it so it’s ring/open spanner and nothing else. Got two thirds the way with an adjustable as I didn’t own a 23mm spanner. Fearing the adjustable was going to round the nut off I trotted down to Halfords and bought the required tool. Except it wasn’t. In my haste I’d measured the replacement nut, which is indeed a 23mm. The nut coming off was a 22mm. Fuck. My. Life. The adjustable clearly wasn’t going to finish the job, the nut was already showing signs of rounding. ‘Fuck it’ thought I, out came the angry grinder and off with the nut and the top of the ball joint threads. Ball joint separator out, but no joy getting the taper to let go even with the 3lb lump hammer and a significantly heavier lump swinging it. Time for an upgrade: The 14lb sledge did the job, big adjustable was for getting around the inner track rod end. After much swearing, a finger cut and a grazed leg the offside now looks like this: Just the near side to do now, hopefully it doesn’t piss it down tomorrow afternoon. Must also buy a 22mm spanner on the way home from work.

That DS looks very at home there.

More A8 stuff: oil and filters change. @Kiltox did mention it needed a service when I bought it, so amongst the boxes of Range Rover parts arriving there were also 10 litres of 5w30, an oil filter and an air filter. Its the first time I’ve used the Lidl oil pump: Genuinely a game changer. If you’re putting off an oil change because you don’t want to be scrabbling around under the car, spilling oil on your drive etc, get one. 8+ litres out and into a couple of bottles within 10 mins and no mess. I’d still be wanting to do a full sump drain every 3rd change just because it’s likely there’ll still be a few hundred ml’s of old oil that the pipe down the dipstick won’t have picked up, but even draining via the sump plug you’ll never get all the schmutz out without also removing the sump itself and giving it a proper bath. Filter housing wiped down, new o-ring on the housing cap, and new filter in and pre-filled as much as possible: Never hurts to fill an oil filter up with oil, this took a good litre and a half to bring it up to the level seen here. Don’t fill this type of filter housing to the brim, or it’ll overflow when the cap is screwed down. New air filter as the old one was a bit grim (though by no means the worst I’ve seen): All cleaned, plastics all wiped down, all done. Less than an hour including a brew stop and dealing with the kids asking questions. It was only as I was cleaning the cover that I noticed the Audi badge missing - it’s irritating me enough now that I think I need to order one…

The front bumper is a bit mangled on the A8, and the n/s fog light surround was completely missing. Thankfully a new pair of grilles were supplied with the car so on they went this evening: Much better. Just some duct tape residue to remove, and then an attempt at getting the bumper and wings to fit together properly at some point.

So with the A8 in, there have been two departures from the fleet - last night someone asked me if i'd be prepared to sell the bus. It's been laid up in Devon for the last 4 years and I've not had chance to do anything with it, realistically it would be next year before I could do anything. A price was agreed, deposit paid and now I'm crating up the spares that are here ready for collection. The new owner has been after it for a while, and it seems all the stars have aligned to get it undercover and properly cared for so I'm relatively happy to let it go. Maybe I'll own another bus in the future, but not yet. Also, the ZT has just departed for pastures old - a previous owner (not on here) spotted the advert on Facebook and came this evening to see it, and then departed with it. Sad to see it go to be honest, but I don't have the time to do anything more with it and even doing any filming ground to a halt thanks to all the rain. Next up is a bit of work on the Range Rover, the inner track rods are rattling like a skeleton wanking in a biscuit tin and it's due an oil + filters change, so its coming off the road for a few weeks while the A8 takes over daily driving duties.

The Nova ‘Spin’, which I’m fairly sure is the one thing I’d rather not happen when driving a Nova. Would have been followed by the Nova ‘Understeer’, Nova ‘Slide’, Nova ‘Skid’ and Nova ‘Smack into a wall’.

And home. Cruise control almost all the way, 41.9mpg achieved which isn’t bad at all for a big old barge. Thanks again to @Kiltox for a nice easy transaction.

Derv station shot:

Abandon all hope all ye who enter: Anyway, I’m off out of the black hole of despair, been there three times today and that’s four times too many. Onwards with some inspiring* views:

So, off we go again:

Tanat Valley 471. 1989 B10M. Looked a bit tired, went very well. 402 (1992 B10M) was definitely tidier and better inside, but didn’t have the go to match the show: Mind you, I’d have taken K2 anywhere in preference to the trio of these: Javelin/UVG piles of absolute wank. A heavily drugged sloth could move quicker, and the driver’s area was cramped and uncomfortable. Utter shite.

I’m keen (especially as it’s very local) subject to the caveats of actually being available and my family not dumping a fair sized problem in my lap the day I’m planning to attend…

It would have gone well because by that age Plaxton’s built in age-related lightness programme would have been well advanced!